Twenty-five years later, Cape Breton man's disappearance still a mystery

SaltWire Network

Published: Sep 20, 2017 at midnight

Updated: Oct 02, 2017 at 11:50 a.m.

This photo of Allan Kenley Matheson was taken in the summer of 1990, two years before the Acadia University student from Glendale, Inverness Co., went missing.

SYDNEY, N.S. — The sister of a Glendale, Inverness Co., man who disappeared in Wolfville 25 years ago is still feeling the pain of her loss but is now focusing on her brother’s life, not his disappearance.

Kayrene Willis, a high school teacher in Scottsdale, Arizona, is the sister of Allan Kenley Matheson, who went missing on Sept. 21, 1992 in Wolfville at the age of 20, while attending Acadia University with the hopes of majoring in biology.

She said that although she still grieves the loss of her brother, she wants to remember him how he was.

“I have to look at the fact that he has been gone for 25 years and I was the closest with him out of anyone in my life and it’s still very painful, but I have to find the joy in every day and not focus on his disappearance but focus on the time we had together,” said Willis.

On Sept. 7, 1992, Matheson and Willis, who was 18 at the time, began their first year of University at Acadia. Matheson had taken two years off after graduating high school in Port Hawkesbury to drive a motorcycle across the country, plants trees in British Columbia, try to save the rainforests in South America and visit Guatemala and Belize.

Willis said that the last time she saw Matheson was on Sunday, Sept. 20, at around 4 p.m. Less than two weeks into his first semester, Matheson vanished without a trace. His passport, clothes, toiletries, and a sum of money Matheson saved from planting trees hadn't been touched.

Because of the two years Kenley spent traveling before he came to Acadia, police initially did not believe that a crime had been committed.

Willis said that she and her family believe the investigation wasn’t handled properly.

“Things weren’t handled properly from the beginning and it wasn’t seen as a crime at that time. I believe that it is, I believe that there was foul play involved,” said Willis “I don’t believe that he just took off and that part has been hard for my family, especially my mom. She’s always wanted it to be investigated thoroughly.”

Matheson’s case has since been labelled as a possible homicide. Willis said although so much time has passed. Her brother’s death is still surprising to her.

“It’s still a shock and it’s still a mystery, even recently my parents and I were talking about it and we don’t feel any closer to the answers than we did 25 years ago.”

In 2013, documentary filmmaker Ron Lamothe started a Kickstarter campaign to make a film about Matheson's disappearance. The film is currently in production and Willis said when she was in Nova Scotia this summer she got a chance to meet with Lamothe.

Willis added that the documentary has already given her family a sense of healing.

“I think it has already provided the sense of just feeling that everything was fully looked at and for my mom, I think that was her greatest wish that we aren’t really expecting a miracle for him to be found even though that would be amazing,” said Willis “It’s just that someone looked at it with that depth and that has been provided with the documentary.”

Willis said that the documentary is scheduled to be released sometime in 2019.

For more information about the documentary of the disappearance of Allan Kenley Matheson, visit https://www.facebook.com/missingkenley/

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FAST FACTS

• Allan Kenley Matheson has been missing since Sept. 21, 1992 from Acadia University in Wolfville.

• Born May 8, 1972, he was 20 at the time of his disappearance.

• At the time he disappeared, Matheson stood 5’ 9” and weighted 150 lbs.